The present invention relates to a device with a movable door seal for a displaceable door panel of an elevator installation and an elevator installation with such a device.
Conventional elevator installations comprise an elevator car, which moves vertically upwardly and downwardly in an elevator shaft and can usually move to several floors. The elevator shaft has shaft doors with at least one horizontally displaceable shaft door panel. A car door with at least one horizontally displaceable car door panel is disposed at the elevator car. The car door moves together with the elevator car in the shaft. In each instance one of the shaft doors and the car doors may open automatically only if the elevator car reaches a floor which it is moving to. The shaft doors of all other floors in that case must remain closed. The elevator installation therefore comprises a coupling device by way of which an unlocking mechanism of the shaft doors and the car doors are so coupled that during normal operation of the elevator installation the shaft doors of a floor and the car doors open only when the elevator car stops in the region of the corresponding floor. On opening, the shaft door is driven by the car doors, wherein the shaft door panel and the car door panel open virtually simultaneously.
An elevator installation described in European Patent Specification EP 0 332 841 B1 comprises a coupling device which so couples the shaft doors with the car door that an unlocking of the shaft doors by the car doors is possible. Each shaft door panel has two shaft door panel entraining rollers, termed shaft door rollers in the following. The shaft door rollers are so constructed and arranged that the shaft door rollers together with a shaft door panel are displaceable against a closing force transversely to the travel direction of the elevator car. Moreover, there is associated with the elevator car for each car door panel an entrainer unit that substantially comprises two symmetrically arranged runner units which extend in the travel direction of the elevator car. The runner units are displaceable transversely to the travel direction. They lie closely beside one another and do not contact the shaft door rollers when the elevator car is disposed in travel and moves past the shaft doors of the different floors. If the elevator car reaches a floor to be moved to, then the runner units are separated from one another transversely to the travel direction of the elevator car and pass into the region of contact of the shaft door rollers. The runner units execute a part movement which is employed, for example, to mechanically unlock the car door panel. Unlocking of the shaft door panels can also be effected by this part movement. After the unlocking, the runner units execute a common horizontal movement which is here termed opening movement. Through this opening movement the car door panels open the panels of the shaft doors.
Details of such an entrainer unit with runners are shown in the European Patent Application EP 02 405 810.9, which was filed on Sep. 18, 2002 and bears the title “Kopplungssystem zum Entriegeln eines Schachttürflügels und eines Kabinentürflügels”.
Door gaps, which have to be sealed off by sealing lips or the like, result between the car door panels and the elevator car as well as between the shaft door panels and the shaft door frame. It is a disadvantage of these sealing lips that they rub along a sealing surface during the opening and closing of the door panels. This rubbing leads firstly to a wear of the sealing lips and secondly disruptive noises can be caused by the rubbing. Worn sealing lips no longer satisfactorily fulfil their sealing function. As a result, disturbing air currents in the elevator car or in the shaft door region can arise particularly in the case of high performance elevators which move very rapidly. Moreover, disturbing noises can penetrate into the elevator car.
High pressure differences, which necessitate an intact sealing system, arise particularly with high performance elevators.
In the case of fire, passengers of an elevator can be put at risk by smoke gases. Accordingly, the door seals at the shaft doors have to be so designed that they delay or even prevent penetration of conflagration gases into the elevator shaft.
A sealing system for a car door is described in European Patent EP 616 970 B 1. There an elevator car is proposed, the car door panels of which are guided along a rail which has inclined sealing surfaces. Each car door panel is provided with an angle profile member which also has an inclined surface. If the car door panels are closed, then the inclined surfaces of the angle profile members approach the inclined sealing surfaces. If the car door panels are closed, then these surfaces lie on one another and serve as a seal. This arrangement is costly. A rubbing of the surfaces cannot, however, be prevented by this solution.
Another form of sealing system is shown in the U.S. Pat. No. 4,058,191. In this patent, an elevator installation is described which has a movable seal between the elevator car and the elevator shaft. Thus, at standstill of the elevator car at the level of a floor, disturbing air currents in the door region are reduced. According to this patent a seal of the elevator car is mechanically pressed against the shaft wall on opening of the car doors.
A sealing system for sealing the elevator car is described in the U.S. Pat. No. 4,735,293. This system is based on the fact that pressure seals are brought into a sealing position when the car door panels close. For this purpose, the car door panels carry movable seals, which on closing of the panels run against a mechanical abutment and are thereby moved into the sealing position. In that case a horizontal sliding movement of the car door panels is converted into a vertical sliding movement of the seals. On closing of the car door panels there also results in the case of this solution a rubbing movement between the seals and a sealing surface at the elevator car.